5/27/11

I'm a Mom who doesn't mind when her kids watch their favourite shows from time to time. Now that our daughter is almost seven years old she is changing and this includes her interest in TV shows. She enjoys watching a lot of the older-kid to tween geared shows like Hannah Montana and iCarly (Okay, maybe not those specific, I don't know all their names!) but I find the characters in those shows coming across as "fake" the way they act, dress etc. Lots of make-up and sometimes questionable phrases that fly over kid's heads and not really something her little brother enjoys watching as he prefers watching his preschooler cartoons. I was recently introduced to a great web based series that both K and I can approve of: Ruby Skye P.I.!Ruby Skye P.I. is Canada's first digital detective web series geared toward tweens. Created by Jill Golick, Ruby Skye P.I. brings you that great detective suspense we used to read in detective novels as kids ourselves in an all-new digital webisode series online! Ruby Skye (played by Madison Cheeatow) is a lovable, smart, quick thinking and rather nosey young lady who can't resist the urge to get involved and get to the bottom of every mystery she comes across in her downtown Toronto neighbourhood - whether friends and neighbours want her 'help' or not getting herself in a little trouble along the way.Along with her little sister Hailey Skye (played by Marlee Maslowe) who is on a mission to petition out plastic water bottles and best friend Griffin (played by Kevin Gutierrez), Ruby Skye P.I. will have your tween solving the mystery from beginning to end. The series features 12 mini-webisodes (about 3-5 minutes each episode).

What drew me toward Ruby Skye P.I. is that it's a wholesome, Canadian show that both my daughter and I can enjoy together. This long weekend we spent some mom and daughter time checking out the Ruby Skye P.I. series and also all the fun features the website has to offer.I like that it's web-based, that way our daughter can sit and watch episodes on my net book while her little brother enjoys his cartoons on the regular TV. More shows should come out web based like this!The webisodes are fun and short so my girl had no problem following the story and getting to know the characters, even I found myself asking K what happened when I missed a small part answering the phone. The story had her engaged the whole time, wanting to hurry up and click the "next episode" button! The story line made me laugh a little as Ruby Skye P.I. was focused on a neighbour possibly being ripped off by a Nigerian e-mail scam, you know, those emails from rich attorneys (or in this case a "prince") saying they need your help in getting money out of their country after some sort of tragic loss and as payment they "promise" to make you rich? We get our share of those emails ourselves. It was a great addition solving a mystery using that as the crime in question.Being a tech-family we liked the fact that the kids in the show are using today's popular technology like laptops, digital Polaroid cameras and iPhone. The series teaches a lesson about consequences for your actions, friendship and working together when Ruby gets herself into trouble for digging a little too deep in the wrong direction! Luckily she is bright and figures everything out for an overall happy ending! On the website we found many fun, interactive things to do after watching the series like checking out the bios, yummy brownie recipes (Ruby Skye P.I. loves baking brownies!) and "Hailey Hacks" videos which are fun web tips for kids like setting face book privacy, google maps and how to use wish lists on amazon.com among others. Excellent for parents who have concerns about their kids safety online, Our daughter is starting to learn more about computers and the Internet as shes getting older and I'm glad I'm able to teach her at a young age through resources like this.You can interact with Ruby Skye P.I. on the website by leaving a message, liking the Ruby Skye P.I. Face book fan page and follow @RubySkyePI on Twitter for all the latest updates!My girl will be turning seven in a couple of months however, I previewed the first episode of Ruby Skye P.I. to make sure it was suitable for her maturity and happily it is and we enjoyed all the episodes together! So, if you have a little girl who's younger than eight, watch the show for yourself first as it is geared toward tweens and have a little mom-daughter time watching Ruby Skye P.I.! We really enjoyed the 12 episodes that are now available to watch for FREE on www.rubyskyepi.com and we hope that they come out with more for us to watch! Posted by AME on behalf of Ruby Skye PI. Complimentary Product received as a thank you. Opinions and comments on this blog are those of the author.

My daughter Delphine, age 13 loves Ruby Skye. Every Monday and Thursday she would race off the bus, straight to the family computer (kicking off her brother or myself) to watch the latest episode of Ruby Skye. No other show has caught her attention like Ruby Skye, perhaps Glee. She can't wait for Ruby's next mystery.